Candidates are listed in alphabetical order. Positions are categorized as Pro (Yes), Con (No), Not Clearly Pro or Con, or None Found.
Candidates who have withdrawn or who no longer meet our criteria are listed last.

Pro (Yes)

Con (No)

Clinton, Hillary (D) - Pro Hillary Clinton, U.S. Senator (D-NY), in a Dec. 9, 2003 article titled "Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions" on her U.S. Senate website, stated: "...I am today introducing the 'Protecting American Democracy Act of 2003,' which amends by adding a voter verification requirement for voting systems to give each voter an opportunity to verify his or her vote at the time the vote is cast. Voters will be given an opportunity to correct any error made by the voting system before the permanent voting record is preserved. While requiring that all election jurisdictions give voters the ability to verify their votes, this legislation also gives States and local jurisdictions the flexibility to employ the most appropriate, accurate, and secure voter verification technologies, which may include voter-verifiable paper ballots, votemeters, modular voting architecture, and/or encrypted votes, for their State or jurisdiction in a uniform and nondiscriminatory manner. Any voter verification method used must ensure that voters with disabilities and other affected voters have the ability to cast their vote in private, and language minorities must have equal access in verifying their vote." Dec. 9, 2003 Hillary Clinton

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Gravel, Mike (Lib) - Pro Mike Gravel, former U.S. Senator (D-AK), issued the following statement through his press secretary, Alex Colvin, in a Oct. 19, 2007 email to ProCon.org: "Yes, to ensure that no more Presidential elections are stolen." Oct. 19, 2007 Mike Gravel

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Keyes, Alan (Ind) - None Found     ProCon.org emailed the Keyes campaign on Mar. 26, 2008 with this question. We had not received a reply or found a position as of Apr. 11, 2008.

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McCain, John (R) - None Found No position found as of Oct. 19, 2007. ProCon.org also emailed the McCain campaign on Oct. 10, 2007 with this question. They did not respond to our email or follow up call.

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McKinney, Cynthia (Grn) - Pro Cynthia McKinney, Former U.S. House Representative (D-GA), cosponsored the Feb. 2, 2005 "Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act of 2005" (H.R.550), which stated: "To amend the Help America Vote Act of 2002 to require a voter-verified permanent paper record or hard copy under title III of such Act, and for other purposes." Feb. 2, 2005 Cynthia McKinney

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Nader, Ralph (Ind) - Not Clearly Pro or Con Ralph Nader, Attorney, author, and political activist, stated in a Dec. 14, 2004 article titled "Ralph Nader on the Ohio Recount," posted on the Democracy Now! website: "New Hampshire has a Secretary of State that’s been there for many years, very non-partisan, very professional. And they have a paper trail. And one of the things that we proved in New Hampshire as—people who want more detail can go to our web site votenader.org—is that the system worked there because there was a paper trail. But in Maryland and other states where there was not a paper trail, there’s no way to make that kind of quick parallel connections." Dec. 14, 2004 Ralph Nader

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Obama, Barack (D) - Pro Barack Obama, U.S. Senator (D-IL), cosponsored the "Ballot Integrity Act of 2007" (S.1487), a bill "To amend the Help America Vote Act of 2002 to require an individual, durable, voter-verified paper record under title III of such Act, and for other purposes": "TITLE II-BALLOT INTEGRITY Sec. 201. Promoting accuracy, integrity, and security through individual, durable, voter-verified paper records. Sec. 202. Requirement for mandatory manual audits." May 24, 2007 "Ballot Integrity Act of 2007" (S.1487) (PDF) 175 KB

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Paul, Ron (R) - None Found No position found as of Oct. 31, 2007. ProCon.org also emailed the Paul campaign on Oct. 10, 2007 with this question. They did not respond to our email or follow up call.

CANDIDATES WHO HAVE WITHDRAWN OR WHO NO LONGER MEET OUR CRITERIA     Biden, Joe (D) - Pro Joe Biden, U.S. Senator (D-DE), cosponsored the "Ballot Integrity Act of 2007" (S.1487), a bill "To amend the Help America Vote Act of 2002 to require an individual, durable, voter-verified paper record under title III of such Act, and for other purposes": "TITLE II-BALLOT INTEGRITY Sec. 201. Promoting accuracy, integrity, and security through individual, durable, voter-verified paper records. Sec. 202. Requirement for mandatory manual audits." May 24, 2007 "Ballot Integrity Act of 2007" (S.1487) (PDF) 175 KB Top      Brownback, Sam (R) - None Found   Withdrew on Oct. 19, 2007; no position found as of that date Top    Dodd, Chris (D) - Pro Chris Dodd, U.S. Senator (D-CT), stated in a June 21, 2005 U.S. Senate "Statement of Senator Christopher J. Dodd, Committee on Rules & Administration, Hearing on Voter Verification in Federal Elections": "I am not opposed to states requiring a voter verified audit trail - the provision I authored in HAVA [Help America Vote Act] already requires that states establish a permanent paper record with audit capacity for election systems. But I am opposed to federally mandating that states implement voter verification by means of a paper record only. Regrettably, that is what the legislation proposed last year required, and that is what some legislation reintroduced this Congress requires. Such a requirement would discriminate against the disabled and those who are language minorities and the illiterate." June 21, 2005 Chris Dodd Top    Edwards, John (D) - Pro John Edwards, former U.S. Senator (D-NC), issued a statement by his National Campaign Manager David Bonior in a letter to Alan Dechert, President of Open Voting Consortium, on June 21, 2007: "Senator Edwards believes that is is essential that all voting machines produce a verifiable paper ballot. To ensure security, these machines should be programmed with an open source code for complete transparency, and election results should be safeguarded by voter-verified paper records." June 21, 2007 John Edwards Top      Gilmore, Jim (R) - None Found   Withdrew on Aug. 14, 2007; no position found as of that date Top      Giuliani, Rudy (R) - None Found     No position found as of Nov. 16, 2007. ProCon.org also emailed the Giuliani campaign on Nov. 19, 2007 with this question. They did not respond to our email or follow up call.   Top      Huckabee, Mike (R) - None Found     No position found as of Oct. 30, 2007. ProCon.org also emailed the Huckabee campaign on Oct. 10, 2007 with this question. They did not respond to our email or follow up call.   Top      Hunter, Duncan (R) - None Found     No position found as of Nov. 2, 2007. ProCon.org also emailed the Hunter campaign on Oct. 10, 2007 with this question. They did not respond to our email or follow up call.   Top    Imperato, Daniel (3rd/I) - Pro Daniel Imperato, an Independent candidate and business entrepreneur, issued the following statement through his press secretary, Joseph Oddo, in a Nov. 30, 2007 email to ProCon.org: "Yes, for now but better, more secure voting systems should be implemented. Popular vote for the president and term limits too." Nov. 30, 2007 Daniel Imperato Top    Kubby, Steve (3rd/I) - Pro Steve Kubby, founder of the American Medical Marijuana Association, stated in an Oct. 29, 2007 email to ProCon.org: "Absolutely. There are enough questionable aspects to our election system as is -- bars to ballot access for third party and independent candidates, abysmal turnout which we usually interpret as apathy but which could just as easily be disgust with the system, etc. The least we can do is insist that the votes that ARE cast be accurately and verifiably tabulated." Oct. 29, 2007 Steve Kubby Top    Kucinich, Dennis (D) - Pro Dennis Kucinich, U.S. Representative (D-OH), in a Nov. 28, 2003 Press Release, stated "Diebold Withdraws Legal Threats," stated: "An open and honest examination of the flaws in electronic voting will lead us to only one possible conclusion: electronic voting machines are dangerous to democracy because there is no way of ensuring their accuracy. We need to have a voter-verified paper trial for every election so that any errors and irregularities caused by the voting machines can be discovered." Nov. 28, 2003 Dennis Kucinich Top    McEnulty, Frank (3rd/I) - Pro Frank McEnulty, an Independent candidate and President of Our Castle Homes, in an Oct. 30, 2007 email to ProCon.org, stated: "It is always best when drastically changing systems to maintain an audit trail to ensure that the new system works as intended and to build the confidence of the user (public) in those systems. For those reasons, I believe it is important to maintain voter verified paper audit trails for the next several election cycles." Oct. 30, 2007 Frank McEnulty Top    Richardson, Bill (D) - Pro Bill Richardson, Governor of New Mexico, stated in a June 19, 2007 The Hill Op-ed titlted "A Reliable, Verifiable Vote in 2008": "Every federal election since 2000 has clearly shown that [voting] machines can and do malfunction. In New Mexico, in 2002 these voting systems lost the votes of almost 13,000 citizens, and in 2004 they failed to register the candidate of choice for many voters. If there is no accurate and verifiable paper record of voter intent, there is no accountable means of determining a winner." June 19, 2007 Bill Richardson Top      Romney, Mitt (R) - None Found     No position found as of Oct. 25, 2007. ProCon.org also emailed the Romney campaign on Oct. 10, 2007 with this question. They did not respond to our email or follow up call.   Top    Smith, Christine (3rd/I) - Pro Christine Smith, a Libertarian candidate and a social and political activist, stated in a Nov. 12, 2007 email to ProCon.org: "Yes. I will work to ensure free and fair elections through verifiable paper voting - which may include use of technological advances such as computer screens in voting booths but always with a paper printout of the selected choices which is then signed and provided for actual voting." Nov. 12, 2007 Christine Smith Top      Tancredo, Tom (R) - None Found     No position found as of Nov. 1, 2007. ProCon.org also emailed the Tancredo campaign on Oct. 10, 2007 with this question. They did not respond to our email or follow up call.   Top      Thompson, Fred (R) - None Found     No position found as of Oct. 19, 2007. ProCon.org also emailed the Thompson campaign on Oct. 10, 2007 with this question. They did not respond to our email or follow up call.   Top      Thompson, Tommy (R) - None Found   Withdrew on Sep. 12, 2007; no position found as of that date Top      Vilsack, Tom (D) - None Found   Withdrew on Feb. 23, 2007; no position found as of that date

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